


Death By Diamonds & Pearls

by good_old_days



Category: Peaky Blinders (TV)
Genre: F/M, Post-Season/Series 04
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-04-21
Updated: 2019-07-02
Packaged: 2020-01-23 15:24:07
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 12,824
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18552493
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/good_old_days/pseuds/good_old_days
Summary: Saddled with an unwanted collection of stolen jewels, Tommy turns to an old friend of Alfie Solomons for a simple solution. The solution he finds is anything but simple, just like the woman who offers it.





	1. Chapter 1

Someday, Tommy thought, maybe he’d just get paid in cash like a normal fucking person. No more shipments of contraband guns, or properties signed over with questionably legal deeds, or sacks of fucking diamonds that he had to resell through specious channels at a great deal of personal risk and annoyance.

            That last situation was the one he found himself in currently. He was sitting behind the desk in his Birmingham office, eyes narrowed as he glanced between the aforementioned sack of diamonds and Arthur.

            “They was eight months behind on payments for that betting license at Chester, and would’ve gone eight more at least if I didn’t accept this. Said cash flow is low due to some new operations they got running out of Liverpool—”

            Tommy waved off his brother’s explanation. He had a meeting in half an hour with the foreman at one of the factories here in town, and then had to pack up and get to London for the night. No time for Arthur’s rambling.

            “What the fuck am I supposed to do with a bag of stolen diamonds? Because they’re definitely fucking stolen, no matter what Thompson said to you. I’m an MP now, Arthur. There’ll be more scrutiny into our accounts someday soon, so we can’t handle things like this anymore. It’s got to be cash—above board or not traceable.” He paused, ducking his head to light a fresh cigarette then leaning back in his chair. “What’d Thompson claim they’re worth, anyway? Never mind the fact that they’re fucking useless to us unless we can sell them.”

            “Forty thousand. Full amount he owed.”

            “Forty thousand fucking pounds. Jesus fucking Christ.”

            Arthur reached for the bag, an alarmingly small thing considering the number they’d just discussed.

            “I’ll handle it, Tom.”

            “No, I’ll handle it myself. You handle Thompson. Tell him cash payments, first of the month, from now on or I’m transferring that license to someone who can fucking pay.”

            Arthur smoothed his mustache, clearly annoyed, but didn’t argue. “What’s your plan for the diamonds?”

            “I’ve got a man in London. Old friend of Alfie Solomons.”

            “Well, there’s a fucking glowing recommendation,” Arthur said, a roll of his eyes punctuating his departure.

            _I’ve got a man in London_ may have been a bit overconfident considering what Tommy actually had: a three-year-old business card with the name of a jeweler on it, once given to him by Alfie, now lost somewhere deep in the recesses of his desk. God only knew how they’d ever gotten onto the topic of jewelers in the first place; guiding a conversation with the man had been like driving a car with no steering wheel, three flat tires, and a ruptured brake line.

            “Now mate,” Alfie had said, jabbing one grubby, beringed finger in Tommy’s direction. “You ever come into possession of jewels with a, shall we say, problematic pedigree, you gotta know how to move ‘em. Not as simple as just popping down the high street and sellin’ to the first fuckin’ peddler you clap eyes on, yeah? What you need is discretion, innit? You find yerself in need of discretion, this is the man to call on.”

            They’d been at the bakery in Camden, and Alfie had rifled through his desk until he came up with a business card, which he flicked in Tommy’s general direction.

            “Goldstein. Best fuckin’ fence in the business, mate. You ever need his services, tell ‘im Alfie sent you.”     

            Tommy had thought little of the recommendation at the time, slipping the card into his breast pocket just so Alfie wouldn’t take offense then tossing it into a drawer when he got back to Birmingham. These days, it wouldn’t matter much if he told anyone Alfie sent him, considering he’d been dead for going on a year. But Tommy would just as soon deal with these fucking diamonds as quickly as possible, and with someone he wouldn’t have to see again. With so much changing, he didn’t have the time or patience for cultivating new partnerships at the moment. Forty thousand fucking pounds tied up like this. Fucking Arthur.

            He dug through papers and drawers until he found the card—a simple black and white thing, though the quality of the stock was obvious under his fingertips. _Meyer Goldstein, 74 Hatton Garden, Gemstones, Bespoke & Appraisals_. No hours, no phone number, no adornments. Not even the two extra letters required to spell out ‘ _and_.’ Maybe Meyer Goldstein was a more to-the-point sort of man than Alfie; Tommy could only hope.

 

 

            When he arrived the next afternoon, 74 Hatton Garden proved to be a small shop front in a row of jewelers with similarly Jewish names. Cohen, Silverman, Rosenthal. Not such a surprise, this recommendation coming from Alfie. Some of the shops had elaborate window displays—glittering diamonds, Swiss watches, fairytale tiaras—but the spotless panes that fronted Number 74 were filled instead with a profusion of greenery, blocking the view inside. An understated line of gilt text across the glass of one window announced only “Goldstein Bespoke Jewelers.” He couldn’t even tell if the place was open.

            A twist of the doorknob proved that it wasn’t, at least in the most literal sense. He raised a hand to knock, but then he heard the knob turning and took a step back instead, the sharp October wind whipping his coat around his legs.

            Between the name on the business card and the source of the referral, he’d imagined some slightly altered iteration of Alfie himself would be behind the door. Disheveled beard, wide-brimmed black hat, borderline-unintelligible Cockney patter. Instead, the door opened to reveal a young woman in a demure, impeccably tailored black dress.

            “Good afternoon.”

            Nothing like Alfie at all. She had a crisp, clear voice and an accent that hinted at expensive schooling.

            “Come in.” She stepped to the side so he could enter, shutting the door gently behind him and turning the lock. “Do you have an appointment?”         

            Tommy hadn’t even considered the possibility that he’d need an appointment. It was a fucking jewelry shop. Wasn’t the whole point of the place to be open? Sell things? He looked around the space curiously. The walls were lined by glass cases; most were filled with loose stones, displayed individually inside nests of plush black velvet. Only a few held finished pieces: delicate pearl necklaces, substantial solitaire rings, hairpins and combs frosted with silver filigree. The densely-packed collection of plants he’d spotted outside—some hanging in the window, some in pots on the sill below—gave the room a tropical feel, warm and slightly humid in spite of the chilly fall air outside. When he looked up, the woman had circled around behind one of the cases. She stood with her hands folded on the edge of the counter, a handful of multicolored stones and a jeweler’s loupe arranged near her elbow atop a black cloth. It was clear he’d interrupted her at work.

            “Sir?”

            She was watching him with a faint, impatient line between her eyebrows. He noticed she was wearing a pair of rather large diamond earrings, eye-catchingly brilliant even though they were partially concealed by her dark hair. A Cartier watch—he recognized it as a near-match to one Grace had once owned—peeked out from her sleeve. Expensive things for a shop girl. He wondered if there was something not quite professional going on between Goldstein and his employee. She was pretty enough for that to make sense, he supposed, though it was difficult to judge what was underneath her severe black dress.

            “No appointment,” he said finally. “I’m Thomas Shelby, here to see Meyer Goldstein. I can wait if he’ll be back soon.”

            He decided against giving Alfie’s name. If Goldstein ran in the same circles, he likely knew who Tommy was, too.

            “You’re more than welcome to wait, but it could be quite a while considering Meyer Goldstein has been dead for seven months. If you’re looking for something a bit more prompt, I might be able to help.” She came back around the counter, extending a hand. “I’m his daughter, Ava Goldstein. I run the business now.”

            Alfie’s fence was as dead as he was. That was that, then. Back to square fucking one with the diamonds. Tommy let out a slow breath, trying not to look as irritated as he felt while they shook hands. He had a long drive back to Birmingham tonight, and he could have been on the road for an hour already if he hadn’t taken this meaningless detour.

            “What can I do for you, Mr. Shelby?”

            He studied the woman in front of him. Diminutive stature, a heart-shaped face, wide brown eyes. No more than thirty years old, at most. Not who he’d had in mind to move forty thousand fucking pounds worth of black market diamonds.

            “Nothing, as it turns out. Your father was recommended to me by an old acquaintance for something very particular. Sorry to have wasted your time.”

            “An old acquaintance?” A smile, which he didn’t understand given his brusque reply, played at the corners of her lips. “Alfie Solomons, wasn’t it?”     

            “It was.”

            “Suppose I can forgive you for the outdated information, in that case. Alfie sent a lot of business to my father over the years. I might call him an old acquaintance, too. Remarkable that he’s still sending business my way from beyond the grave.”

            “Remarkable that I’m still taking his advice from beyond it.”

            “Considering the fact that you put him there, it rather is. He was a forceful personality, though.”

            Tommy reflected, a bit belatedly, that it hadn’t been his wisest decision to seek out someone who had once known Alfie. It wasn’t exactly a secret who had been on the other end of the gun when Solomons died. As he understood it, these London Jews stuck together. Perhaps he should’ve put a little more thought into whether Meyer Goldstein—or his daughter, as the case proved to be—would hold a grudge over the matter.

            “No need for that look. Alfie always treated me well enough, but it’s frankly amazing he lived as long as he did. Not hard to see how he could drive a man to violence. The incessant talking alone—”

            She gave a funny, equivocal little shrug, then turned on her heel and rifled under one of the counters. A moment later she emerged with a cigarette case in her tidily manicured hand.

            “Do you smoke, Mr. Shelby?”

            “Thank you.”

            He accepted a cigarette from the case then lit it along with hers. She leaned back with the glowing cigarette between pursed lips and her arms crossed, chin tilted up slightly to meet his eyes.

            “What are you selling, and why don’t you think I can sell it?”

            Her bluntness surprised him, and he busied himself with putting away his lighter to avoid letting that show.

            “Didn’t say I was selling anything, or that you couldn’t do it. Don’t even know what you do, do I?”

            “The same thing my father did when Alfie Solomons recommended him to you. Let’s be frank with one another, all right? I know what type of business you have. Shall I tell you about mine?”

            Tommy pulled his watch from his pocket to glance at the time. If he left now, he’d still be able to make it to Birmingham before the nanny put Charlie to bed.

            “No offense meant, Miss Goldstein, but—”

            “As a woman in my line of work, there’s nothing offensive that hasn’t been said to me before. Trust me on that. You can also trust that if you need to move jewelry quickly, and without the wrong people finding out about it, Alfie’s recommendation is as good as the day he gave it.”

            Now there was a similarity. She was just as pushy and annoying as Solomons had been.

            “And why, exactly,” Tommy punctuated the question with a wave of his cigarette, “would any of that make me trust you?”

            She seemed nonplussed by the question. Didn’t miss a beat, in fact, with her reply.

            “To start, you don’t have a lot of options if you’re here at the suggestion of a dead man who, by all accounts, you didn’t even like. Based on how you’re white-knuckling that briefcase of yours, you’ve brought along whatever you’re trying to sell, so you want to move it quickly, too. And finally, I worked for my father from the time I was seventeen years old. Now that he’s gone, there’s no one better at this than me.”

            She apparently shared Alfie’s boundless self-confidence, too. Either she actually was good at this, or Solomons had only associated with people as utterly mad as he was. Tommy let his cigarette dangle between his lips and transferred the briefcase to his other hand, careful to keep his fingers loose.

            “Why don’t you at least let me have a look? A fair appraisal, no charge.”

            She went back around the counter, the click of her heels quick and confident on the polished floor, and perched herself up on a tall stool. He thought again about those big diamond earrings and the watch glittering on her wrist. Maybe there was something backing up her bravado. She couldn’t be doing too badly for herself if she could afford things like that. Tommy took a slow step toward the counter as she transferred the stones that had been scattered on the cloth to a small tray and picked up the loupe expectantly. Her eyes flicked over him as he moved forward; they were disconcertingly dark, irises blending into the pupils in a way that made it difficult to read her expression.

            “Come on. No harm in an appraisal.” Tommy couldn’t decide if her rapid, confident cadence was annoying or reassuring. “At any rate, I think you’ll be able to overpower me if I try to make off with anything.”

            “Just an appraisal,” he repeated.

            What _was_ the harm, after all? At least he’d find out quickly if any of the stones were fakes. If they were, he’d go all the way to Chester to shoot that miserable fuck Thompson personally. He undid the clasp of his briefcase and pulled out the bag, the diamonds clicking quietly inside. Ava Goldstein held her hand out for it, weighing it in one cupped palm when he reluctantly let go.

            The room fell silent as she plucked out the stones and spread them on the cloth. She’d produced a heavy crystal ashtray at some point and her cigarette balanced on the edge, forgotten, a strand of smoke curling upward in the close air. He watched as she studied the stones through the loupe, starting with the smallest ones, which she divided into several groupings at one corner of the cloth. She slowly worked her way through the collection until she’d reached the largest of the diamonds.

            She held the stone between two slender fingers, turning it for a long time before peering through the loupe. Eventually, she removed the tool from her eye, wiped the glass, adjusted it, held it back in place. After a few more silent moments, she placed the loupe and the diamond quietly at the center of the cloth, picked up her cigarette, and met his eyes.

            “Tell me, Mr. Shelby. Do you have a death wish, or are you just an idiot?”


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi everyone! Thanks for all of your lovely comments on the first chapter! I'm so excited to see where this story goes and I'm thrilled to have you along for the ride. Enjoy!

Honestly, Ava thought, suppressing a sigh as she looked from the diamond on her counter to the man in front of her, wasn’t having a Shelby turn up in your shop enough of a problem without adding anything else to the mix? Not that she’d made the situation easier on herself by calling Tommy Shelby an idiot just now, but what was she supposed to do when the man brought trouble to her doorstep like this?

            As she waited for an answer, the man in question fixed her with an icy stare. He had both hands in his pockets and a cigarette dangling from the corner of his mouth. She thought she caught a minute shift in his shoulders, followed by a barely-there ripple in the clean line of his trousers that might have been his fingers bunching into fists below the fabric. She kept a pistol under the counter. Could she reach for it in time if she had to?

            The entire family was infamous, but she’d never had the pleasure—or misfortune—of meeting a Shelby in person. Everything she knew about them was secondhand from Alfie, her father, and their associates. At present, she was thinking about something she’d heard just after Alfie’s death.

           

            Her father had been quite ill himself by then—short of breath most days, prone to hunched-over fits of coughing, heavily reliant on a cane—but he’d insisted on going to sit shiva. At odds with his perpetually unkempt appearance, Alfie had owned a tidy house on a quiet street in Kentish Town. (She’d always wondered what he told his neighbors he did for a living.) After the pair of them settled into two stiff-backed chairs lined up against the sitting room wall, her father turned to her.

            “Have you heard how it happened, Chava?” He was the only one who still insisted on using her given name, years after everyone else had let it go. “It was Tommy Shelby.”

            Ava looked over at her father in surprise. “I thought Alfie and Tommy Shelby were working together?”

            “You know how things go.”

            He raised one hand, palm open, then settled it atop the head of his cane. After working by her father’s side for so many years, Ava knew exactly how things went. Alliances not held together by family ties inevitably fell apart, and even family was no guarantee. She nodded, readjusting her handbag where it rested on the black crepe skirt covering her knees.

            “They’re gypsies, you know,” her father continued. “They say that Shelby boy shook hands with the devil, came back from the dead in France—”

            “He probably started that rumor himself to scare people,” Ava said, keeping her voice low.

            Though he’d come to London long before Ava was born, Meyer Goldstein had never been able to fully relinquish his old country superstitions. He clung to them as he did that guttural, archaic pronunciation of her name. She was in no mood for them today, her nerves set on edge by how slowly her father had moved when she helped him into the car, how worn and pale he looked in his black suit. She should have forced him to stay at home and come on her own to pay the family’s respects.

            “For a man to survive as long as he has in this business—” He punctuated the half-formed thought with that same open-palmed gesture, plus an upward flick of his thick grey eyebrows.

            “Abba,” she murmured, glancing around at Alfie’s somber aunts and cousins, the shrouded mirrors. “It’s no place for that kind of talk.”

            At the time, her admonishment had felt proper. Now, she found herself wishing she’d listened.

 

            There _was_ an otherworldly air about Tommy Shelby that made her father’s gossip seem less outlandish than it had that day in Alfie’s house. Something stony and self-possessed in the set of his jaw, a perturbing lack of emotion in the cool blue expanse of his eyes. Shelby hadn’t moved since her ill-conceived question. Finally, he raised one hand and plucked the cigarette from his lips, stepping forward to stub it out in the ashtray near her elbow. Ava did her best not to flinch.

            “It’s a fucking terrible business model you’ve got, Miss Goldstein. Locking customers out, then insulting them once they finally get inside.”

            A joke? Sharp-edged, but a kind of joke nonetheless. The last thing she’d expected. Either she hadn’t offended him so terribly, or he didn’t take her seriously at all.

            “No offense meant,” she said, echoing his earlier phrase, “but you don’t have a great deal of room to question my business practices when you’ve come into my shop with a diamond no dealer in London would touch with a ten-foot pole.”

            The taut annoyance on Shelby’s face mingled with confusion. “What are you talking about?”

            From the moment she’d picked up that final diamond, Ava had wondered if he knew the truth or not. She’d briefly suspected that he’d brought the thing to her hoping to fool her into taking it. That maybe he’d known her father was dead and thought it would be easy to dupe a woman. His current, perplexed expression, however, felt too genuine.

            “May I ask where you got these diamonds? In professional confidence, of course.”

            He sighed, squaring his shoulders and angling his eyes downward to study the stones in question.

            “My brother, like a fucking idiot, accepted them as payment from a man with a substantial debt to our business.”

            “And where did that man get them?”

            “He didn’t mention it.”

            Ava picked up the largest diamond again, turning it between two fingers. “Probably because he knew you’d never take them if he did.”

            Shelby gestured at the stone with an imperious flick of his fingers. Clearly, he wasn’t the type of man accustomed to waiting, or accustomed to not having an iron grip on every detail of his business.

            “Well, are you going to tell me what that fucking thing is?”       

            In most situations, Ava didn’t put up with condescending behavior from men. She’d learned from an early age that the only way she’d ever succeed in her father’s world—in a man’s world—was to stand up for herself. But she had to admit that she was a little bit afraid, locked alone in a shop with Tommy Shelby. She’d heard rumors about him that were far more concerning than her father’s fairytales; maybe she’d pushed her luck as far as she should.

            “Do you know who Stefano Rosetti is, Mr. Shelby?” He shook his head. “He’s a big timer in New York. Made a fortune in casinos and rum running these last few years, and spent a good amount of that money on his mistress, an English girl named Daisy Watkins.”

            Shelby sighed again, this one an impatient huff. “I came here to get rid of these diamonds, not listen to fucking gossip.”

            “Humor me for a moment. Miss Watkins is the daughter of Sir Reynold Watkins, who disinherited his daughter for gallivanting around London with her married gangster boyfriend. Unfortunately for him, he didn’t get around to it before Daisy ran off with all the heirloom jewelry from the family vault.”

            “Fairly certain the man I got these from isn’t a toff’s daughter named Daisy.”

            Shelby looked ready to gather up the diamonds and leave. Ava hurried on.

            “I’m nearly finished. A few months ago, Daisy and Rosetti were staying here in town when their hotel room was robbed. Whoever pulled off the heist got away with all of Daisy’s jewelry, including—” She opened her palm to reveal the stone—“this diamond, which was once the center stone of a tiara. I don’t know where your man got it, but he’s a lunatic if he stole it, because one of the most prominent gangsters in New York turning London upside down looking for the bloody thing. Never mind the fact that Daisy has gotten back into her father’s good graces lately, and _he_ had the connections to get Scotland Yard on the case.”

            Shelby’s expression had undergone another transformation, now molded into complete disbelief. “And how do you know it’s the same stone?”

            “It was relatively famous before Daisy ever got her hands on it. This was the center stone of a tiara that once belonged to the Duchess of Devonshire—the Watkins are distant relatives—and it was a real family showpiece.”          

            “Looks like any other fucking diamond to me.”    

            “Come have a look through the loupe.”

            Ava took her chance to return his imperious flick of the fingers. Shelby closed the distance between them and picked up the loupe, then held out his palm so she could drop the stone into it. She studied his hands—blunt, tidy nails and a scratched gold signet ring—as he turned the diamond to catch the filtered light from the window. He closed one eye as he held the loupe up to the other, lashes fanning out across the high angle of his cheekbone. They were long, strangely soft and feminine considering the man they belonged to.

            “Now,” Ava said, assuming the teacher’s role her father had once played when she sat beside him in their workshop, “obviously the size of the stone is a showstopper, but the cut is a bit unusual, too. The marquise was all the rage then but you don’t see it so much today. Look at the top point, though.”

            She waited for him to shift the loupe, remembering how strange it was to look through one if you didn’t have years of practice.

            “See the inclusion? That little imperfection? It looks like a lightning bolt?” Shelby nodded, one eye still scrunched shut. “The stone was cut and set in the 1750s, just after Benjamin Franklin’s famous electricity experiments. Because of that mark, it became known, rather amusingly, as the Franklin Diamond. A big diamond, a famous owner, that giveaway mark—anyone who knows jewelry would recognize it in a second.”

            Ava felt fairly pleased with herself for what she considered a to-the-point rendition of a convoluted tale. That was one of her favorite parts of her job—sharing the provenance of a particularly valuable stone, or making up a good story where one didn’t exist so she could tack a few more pounds onto the price. Her guest, however, didn’t seem to share her enthusiasm. He put the stone and loupe down abruptly and slipped his hands back into his pockets.

            “Didn’t come here for a history lesson on Benjamin fucking Franklin. I came to see about selling these stones. What’s their value?”

            She surveyed the tidily grouped diamonds in front of her.

            “I’d have to look at each of them more closely, but I’d guess around twenty thousand for all but the one we just discussed.”

            Shelby made no attempt to hide his irritation at the number. “And that one?”

            “I gave you the history lesson to tell you the other one is unsellable. Scotland Yard and the Mafia are looking for it. If anyone is foolish enough to bring it to market, they’ll be facing prison if they’re lucky, and whatever Stefano Rosetti has in mind if they’re not. Representatives from both parties have been to every shop on this street already.”

            They had, in fact, visited her shop within a few days of one another. Ava had been in the clear then, but she suspected that either Rosetti or the detectives, if not both, would circle back eventually. When that happened, she didn’t want the diamond anywhere near her.

            “What’s it worth, though?”

            Ava shrugged. “Thirty thousand pounds, easily. But I’m telling you that no jeweler in London who knows what it is will touch it. And they’ll all know.”

            “So how do I move it?”

            She gave another shrug, this one a bit exasperated. Ava was losing patience with Tommy Shelby. His reputation as a demanding man—and not a particularly pleasant one—was proving to be well-earned. She found herself wishing she could go back to knowing him by reputation only.

            “Your only chance, and I mean this as a real last resort, is to sell it somewhere out of the country. On the Continent, most likely, because you can’t take it to New York. But to be frank, Mr. Shelby, you’re a man who can afford to take a loss on this. Write it off, sell the other stones. Have that one reset and give it away to a woman who can keep quiet.”

            Ava started to gather the diamonds and drop them into their bag. She wanted the things out of her shop as soon as possible. Visions of Stefano Rosetti and his thugs or a pack of Scotland Yard detectives barging through her door began to crowd in her mind. She was halfway through packing the stones away when Shelby spoke.

            “It’s my understanding that you’re a woman who can keep quiet.”

            “I stay quiet by not selling things that’ll get a bullet put through my head. People come to me because I can be discreet.” She held up the large diamond and dropped it into the bag with a click. “This isn’t a discreet kind of thing.”

            “You said the stones are worth fifty thousand, right?”

            Ava nodded. “Easily. More if you have them set first.”

            “They were given to me to pay off a debt of forty. Sell them all and the balance is yours.”

            Now that was an offer that made Ava stop and think. She wasn’t short on cash; her father had done well for himself, and she’d continued to turn a profit that let her live as she liked. Still, ten thousand pounds wasn’t easy to pass up. She used the time it took to tuck away the remainder of the stones to consider his words, without coming to any real conclusion. When everything was neatly stowed in the bag, she pushed it across the counter to Shelby.

            “That’s a generous offer, and one I appreciate. But I can’t give you an answer until I decide if I _can_ sell this diamond without putting myself in more danger than ten thousand pounds is worth.”    

            “How long will it take you to decide?”

            Shelby picked up the bag and dropped it into his briefcase. In spite of herself, Ava felt tremendously relieved at the prospect of him leaving her shop. A nervous electricity, a sense that something dangerous was close at hand, seemed to crackle in the air around Tommy Shelby. She wanted to get far away until she had time to gather her thoughts.

            “Give me until tomorrow evening. I’ll think it through and do a bit more research, all right?”

            “All right.”

            “Meet me at the Queen’s Head in Chelsea at nine. It doesn’t look like much, which makes it the perfect place to talk about something that needs to be kept quiet.”      

            “Tomorrow night, then.”

            Shelby had never taken off his overcoat, so there was no preamble to his departure. He followed his terse words with a nod, then turned and strode out the door. Though he’d kept his cool, his quick agreement proved out her theory that he wanted to be rid of the diamonds as soon as possible. That was some leverage, anyway. She’d take any little bit she could get.

            Ava stood silently behind the counter, both hands resting on its polished edge, for a few minutes after he left. If someone had looked inside, she would have appeared the perfectly attentive business owner, hoping for an after-work shopper to drop in. Eventually, she went to the door and slid the deadbolt into place, then went about the quiet routine of closing the shop. Counting inventory, locking the cases, polishing any errant smudges on the glass. Finally, she went through the workroom and out the back door to the cramped alley where she parked her car every day.

            For the first few years of her life, Ava and her family had lived just around the corner from 74 Hatton Garden. When she was around eight, once her father’s business had expanded thanks to connections with men like Alfie Solomons, they’d moved to Chelsea, into a rambling townhouse on a peaceful terrace with a respectable address. Even then, he’d appreciated the importance of appearances if his children were to ascend beyond his station in life. Every time she walked up to the front door of that townhouse, its marble stairs worn just slightly in the middle by generations of feet before hers, Ava marveled at Meyer Goldstein’s foresight.

            With her father gone and the rest of the family now transplanted to New York, Ava felt the weight of that foresight—of her father’s expectations—acutely. He’d worked tirelessly to make Ava the kind of woman who could be, if not truly respected, at least trusted by their upper-class clientele. And they were the people who had made her family the money for the Chelsea townhouse, for the education she and her brother had received, for the flashy car that she parked in front of those gently worn marble stairs every night.

            Her father had taken risks to build all that, too. He’d always encouraged Ava to do the same, but do it intelligently. To weigh her options carefully, guarding herself and the reputation she worked so hard to maintain. Now she had to decide if Shelby and his diamonds were worth the risk.

            As she stepped into the house and hung up her jacket, her mind tumbled with opposing thoughts. On one hand, ten thousand pounds was a great deal of money. And if she succeeded, she’d be in good graces with Tommy Shelby. There was some measure of safety in making an ally of a man that powerful.

            But there was an equal measure of danger in making an enemy of him if she failed. A much greater one, if she took into account the dual threats of Scotland Yard and Stefano Rossi. Was ten thousand pounds worth a stay in Holloway Prison if she got caught? Was it worth her life?

            Her father had always been one to say, “sleep on it” when faced with an uncertain situation. Probably because he had a singular gift: he could fall asleep any time, under virtually any circumstance. Ava, by contrast, had always been one to sit up and stew all night over a difficult problem. This seeming like one of those nights, she put a record on the gramophone, had the maid brew a pot of coffee, and settled in a chair before the fire. She stayed there long into the night, picturing the shimmer of that marvelous diamond and the cold, frightening weight of Tommy Shelby’s eyes.


	3. Chapter 3

If nothing else, the extra night alone in a London hotel gave Tommy ample time to consider why the fuck he was even entertaining a second meeting with a woman who’d called him an idiot five minutes into their first encounter. Not just any woman, but one who seemed singularly focused on annoying him. That endless story about duchesses and Benjamin Franklin reminded him uncomfortably of Alfie’s ramblings, though it had at least been less violent. Never mind her high-handed comment: _You’re a man who can afford to take a loss on this._ What did she know about what he could and couldn’t afford?

            Probably more than he wanted her to, and that was the problem these days. He hadn’t exactly kept a low profile strong-arming his way into London, rubbing shoulders with Churchill, and landing a seat in Parliament. People knew his name now, and not just people who shared his lax views on the legality of certain activities. And that realization answered the question he’d been asking himself all night, didn’t it? He needed Ava Goldstein because he couldn’t be seen selling the fucking diamonds himself.

            After turning over the matter with a tumbler of whisky at the hotel bar, he’d gone up to his room and done more of the same while staring out the window onto the dim street below. When he finally climbed into bed, two lingering possibly troubled him.

            The first was that she was lying. He knew fuck all about those diamonds, and she could have fabricated the whole story about gangsters and Scotland Yard to drive up the value of her services. Was she foolish enough to try something like that, especially considering she knew how double crossing Tommy had worked out for Alfie? She’d been a difficult read, but he suspected she was smarter than that.

            That left the second possibility: that she’d sell him out to Stefano Rosetti. Tommy didn’t know the first thing about the man, but after the mess with Changretta he was wary of making more American enemies. At least her own business interests made it unlikely that she’d turn him over to Scotland Yard.

            Anyway, there was nothing he could do about any of this half-drunk in his hotel room in the middle of the night. He briefly considered ringing Arthur and letting him know exactly how he felt about being set up for this fool’s errand, but wasn’t sure a shouting match with his brother would do much to improve his evening. Finally, he turned off the lamp and closed his eyes.

 

            Ava Goldstein had been telling the truth about one thing, at least. The Queen’s Head didn’t look like much. A firm believer in making the other party wait when negotiations were at hand, Tommy arrived a few minutes after nine the next night. The pub was a squat, nondescript building, and the gilded paint on its sign was beginning to peel. Inside, he felt distinctly overdressed among a robust crowd of men in rolled-up shirtsleeves and tweedy caps. The barman, knowing an outsider when he saw one, sidled over as he approached.

            “Help you, guv?” the man asked with a curt nod, his hands busy polishing a pint glass with a cloth.

            Tommy had only glanced over the room briefly on his way to the bar, but it was hard to miss the fact that there were no women present at all, never mind the type of woman who wore Cartier watches and diamond earrings.      

            “Whisky, please.” He kept his voice low. “I’m meeting someone—”

            The bartender flicked his eyebrows up briefly as he set aside the pint glass to pour Tommy’s drink.

            “Thought as much. She’s in the snug.” He nodded to a door at the far end of the bar and slid the tumbler across. “Go on through.”

            Tommy picked up his drink and clicked a few coins onto the scarred surface of the bar before making his way down to the nondescript door. He’d spent the day in meetings or on the phone with Pol, which had given him mercifully little time to dwell on his misgivings from the night before. They resurfaced now as he pushed the door open.

            Ava was the only one in the small room, sitting at a banged-up table near the crackling fireplace. She was looking down when he walked in, absently clicking the clasp of her watch open and shut. Tommy noticed that it was a different one than yesterday, though it looked equally expensive.

            “Hello, Mr. Shelby.” She glanced up, clicking the clasp shut one final time. Those dark eyes again, even more unreadable in the dim light of the snug. “Thank you for coming.”

            Tommy took his time replying, shrugging out of his coat and fanning it neatly over the back of his chair before sitting down. He placed his hat on the edge of the table and took a sip of his drink.

            “Have you considered my offer?”

            He’d decided on the drive over that he didn’t have time for pleasantries. The extra day in London had been enough of an imposition, and he wanted this to be a clean, no-nonsense transaction. The kind of thing he needed more of lately, no small talk or complications.       

            Ava raised her own drink to her lips—something clear that looked like a gin and tonic—before lighting a cigarette. Tommy prickled at the gesture, at her playing his waiting game. She kept her fingers curled loosely around her glass as she answered.

            “Extensively. And—” a second thoughtful sip of her drink, leaving a ghost of rose-colored lipstick on the rim—“I think I’ve come up with a plan to suit us both.”

            “Go on.”  
            “I have a client in Paris who might be the right fit. Lots of money, a wife who likes to spend it, and a total lack of good sense. Combined with a touch of a drinking problem…I think he’ll be an easy sell if you’ll let me set it to suit the wife’s tastes.”     

            “Sounds promising.”

            Maybe this would be the clean transaction Tommy wanted after all. Ship the fucking diamond overseas, away from Scotland Yard and the Mafia, far enough away that it wouldn’t be his problem anymore. Collect his money and never talk to Ava Goldstein again.

            “There are a few considerations.”

            Just what he didn’t want to hear. It seemed like there were always a few considerations, whether he was brokering a deal to get Shelby Company shipments overseas, or learning to navigate the choppy waters of Parliament.

            “Such as?”

            “First, I’ll need a bit of time to have the diamond set. The other stones are unremarkable, so I can easily move them as-is, but this one needs a little extra care.”

            “How much time to have it set?”

            “Let’s say a week?” Tommy nodded. Fine, fine. If he could forget about this for a few days, all the better. “The other matter is going to Paris.”

            Tommy nodded and finished his drink, putting the glass down with a definitive thud on the table. Now he saw where this was going, and he was relieved. Couldn’t even be half-nine yet. He’d be back at the hotel with a bottle of whisky much better than anything the Queen’s Head had to offer by ten.

            “Just add on your travel expenses to your cut at the end, whatever it works out to be. No staying at the fucking Ritz, eh?”

            Ava pressed her lips together and sat up straighter in her chair. Her dress tonight was the same severe black as the previous day’s, cut in a shallow boat neck that revealed the shift of her collarbone as she squared her shoulders. The gesture told Tommy he was in for another lecture; he just hoped it wasn’t about Benjamin Franklin.

            “First of all, Mr. Shelby, I only stay at the ‘fucking Ritz’ in Paris. Second, I don’t need your money to do so. Most importantly, I’m not asking you for money. I’m asking you to come to Paris with me.”

            Tommy leaned back in his chair. So much for being at the hotel by ten. Of course, this woman was a fucking lunatic, what else had he really expected from a recommendation given by Alfie?

            “What do you need me in Paris for? Not that I’ve any interest in going.”

            “Because I don’t want to travel alone with merchandise this hot, or with thirty thousand pounds in cash if I do manage to sell it.”      

            “So? Hire a bodyguard with some of that Ritz money if you’re worried about it.”

            “Normally I would, but in the case of something this sensitive, there aren’t many trustworthy men. You, however, have an interest in seeing me succeed safely.”

            “I also have an interest in staying the fuck out of France.”

            That peculiar, sly smile he’d seen yesterday slipped across her lips again. Tommy found himself caught somewhere between annoyance and admiration. This woman had an unerring ability to catch him off guard—and the guts to argue with him in a way most men didn’t, given his reputation. But she was also wasting his time.

            “You know,” Ava tilted her head, that smile still lingering. “My father once told me he heard you shook hands with the devil in France. Did you spread that rumor yourself?”

            That was enough. More than enough. Tommy pushed back his chair and stood, reaching for his coat.

            “Fuck off. Don’t fucking talk about France to me.”

            “That’s no way to talk to a woman, especially one you’re in business with.”

            “We’re not in business anymore. I’ll find someone else to sell the diamonds.”

            As he ducked his head to put on his hat, he heard her chair legs scrape the floorboards. When he looked up, she was standing, too. Hands on her hips, fingers crinkling the inky fabric of her dress.

            “We’re not? Then what if I sell you out to Stefano Rosetti?”

            That fucking bitch. She had been planning something all along. He reached into his jacket, keeping his voice even.

            “And what if I shot you in the head right now for suggesting that?”

            “You’d be sorry if you did.”

            “Don’t think I would, eh?”

            “I have more friends like Alfie Solomons.”

            “What, dead ones?”

            “Ones who’d happily beat your head in if they had an excuse.”

            He drew his hand out from his jacket. Not that he’d seriously considered shooting her anyway, but the fact that she’d stared him down was interesting, to say the least.

            “Mutual death threats aren’t the most auspicious start to a business agreement, in my experience.”         

            Ava retook her seat, crossing her legs elegantly. “On the contrary, now we both know exactly where we stand. Come to Paris, I’ll sell the diamonds. You’ll be forty thousand pounds richer and get to take a vacation.”

            “I don’t take vacations.”

            He tried that. Wasn’t suited to them.         

            “Explains your—” Ava waved a hand at him, still standing with one hand clenched on the back of his chair—“general state of displeasure. Sit down and hear me out, won’t you?”

            In spite of himself, Tommy sat down. Maybe it was the fact that she’d made a joke—at his expense, no less—moments after he’d threatened to pull a gun on her. There was something about Ava Goldstein that made him curious what she’d do next, even though it was unlikely to be good.

            “All right,” she continued when he’d taken his seat. “Here’s my proposal. Once the stone is set, two nights in Paris. One to meet my client, an extra just to be safe. You’re back here glowering at people and casting Labour votes in Parliament before you know it.”

            She’d been doing her research on him. Or she just had an uncommon interest in Parliament. Tommy lit a fresh cigarette, giving himself a moment to think. He shouldn’t have to think about this—shouldn’t even have considered going to Paris—but he was.

            “What’s the purpose of my going to Paris, exactly? I can send one of my men if you just need a bodyguard.”

            “I also need someone who can be seen in polite society with me, no offense to your men.”

            “You have an argument for everything, eh? And how do you know I can be seen in polite society?”

            That elicited a broader grin than he’d gotten before. “Your suits, for starters. Let’s not waste any more of each other’s time. I’ll only do this deal if you’ll take the trip to Paris. It’s a yes or no.”

            He was actually considering it. Actually fucking considering it. Maybe, Tommy thought, all the old head injuries were finally catching up to him. Clouding his judgment. Ava picked up her glass, watching him over the rim.

            “You might even have a little fun.”

            Fun and France had never been closely associated in Tommy’s mind. But there was still the matter of the diamonds. And the fact that she could say anything in this room, then walk out and sell him to Stefano Rosetti. He wouldn’t know if that happened until it was too late. Two days in Paris. It was only two days to make forty thousand pounds and be done with this whole mess.

            “All right. I’ll go to fucking Paris, eh?” He pulled out a business card with his office number in Birmingham and slid it across the table. “Call me when the stone is set and we’ll choose the date.”

            Ava put the card into her handbag and stood, slipping on her coat. Just like everything else she wore it was black and clearly expensive, with a fur collar that reached up to brush the angle of her jaw. She led the way out of the snug, pausing to share a few words with the bartender. The gaze of nearly every man in the room followed her on their way out the door.

            On the street, the fall wind whipping once again, she stopped in front of a sleek little car. Surprising enough that she’d driven herself, even more so that she’d done it in a car like this. Tommy wondered what other little quirks their jaunt to Paris would reveal. She paused with her fingers on the door handle.     

            “Shall I book us rooms at the Ritz, or are you the more economical sort?”

            Tommy shrugged. “You’re paying for it. Depends how much you think you can sell that diamond for.”


	4. Chapter 4

Ava drove home with both hands holding tight to the wheel. Normally, she took a more relaxed approach (much to her father’s chagrin when he’d been alive—a latecomer to driving, he’d always gripped the wheel like a half-tamed beast), but after that encounter, she needed to steady herself. Her mind kept flashing back to Shelby’s move for his gun, the reach quick and reflexive as though he’d moved that way a thousand times before.

            He probably had.

            Between yesterday afternoon and tonight’s meeting, she’d racked her brain for every rumor she’d ever heard about Tommy Shelby. There were plenty to choose from, half-heard and overheard from Alfie and his men in their conversations with her father over the years. Others gleaned from pub chatter and the rare mention of legitimate business in the papers—like Shelby’s perplexing election to Parliament a few months before. How had he pulled _that_ off? She’d have liked to call a few of her own contacts and find out exactly what the Shelby family was tied up in these days, but with a matter this dicey she didn’t dare share it with even her closest friends.

            So, she’d made the decision to offer the Paris plan alone. Risk and reward. Leverage. All weighed out over her largely sleepless night. She still wasn’t sure, exactly, why she hadn’t called everything off at the first hint of a threat. Ten thousand pounds wasn’t so much in the grand scheme of her business, the plan was shakily sketched out at best, and Shelby certainly wasn’t shaping up to be an ideal travel companion.

            It would be worse, though, to back out of the plan now. Shelby seemed adamant about getting rid of the diamond quickly, and Alfie was evidence enough that he had no patience for people who didn’t meet their obligations to him. Ava finally let go of the wheel with one hand and scrubbed it over her face as she turned down her street. Even though she’d made her decision, it was likely to be another restless night.

           

            She woke up early the next morning and went to the shop, settling at her desk with a cup of coffee, a sketchpad, and the records of previous sales to her Paris client. They would serve as her reference point for the new setting. She was a competent jeweler—technically skilled, conscious of the latest trends—but it took her some time to hash out new ideas.

            While Ava had easily outstripped her father’s skill when it came to sales and negotiation, she’d never been able to match his artistry. Her father had possessed a creative gift that hadn’t passed along to Ava or her brother, Ascher. Meyer Goldstein had seemed to feel precisely what each stone needed, to understand something fundamental and pure about how to set it for the perfect depth, the perfect sparkle. Ava could eventually achieve a result that was nearly as good, but she needed time to experiment, scratch out and crumple up a hundred sketches, try out three or four or five settings. Now, without the luxury of time for her workmanlike approach, she wished her father was by her side.

            She’d already spent an hour sketching in silence, promising herself that she’d finally go ahead and buy a damn gramophone to make the office a bit more pleasant, when a knock came at the door. Half-nine. A little early for a client, but not unheard of. Just in case, she went the long way around the shop and slipped the pistol from below the counter into the waistband of her skirt, settling her jacket over it. Not likely that anyone had been watching the shop yesterday and gotten tipped off by Shelby’s visit, but always better to be safe. That, at least, was a lesson her father had managed to pass along successfully.

            Thankfully, no Scotland Yard inspectors or New York mobsters greeted her on the doorstep. Just a slope-shouldered man with a weathered face and tweed flat cap, which he lifted briefly when Ava opened the door.

            “Miss Goldstein?”

            “I’m Ava Goldstein, yes.”

            “I have a package from Mr. Shelby.”

            The man held out a blank paper bag. As soon as she took it, Ava recognized the weight and sound of the stones moving inside. Of course. She’d been so wrapped up in her plan last night that she’d neglected to iron out exactly _how_ she’d get the diamonds to set before going to Paris. Shelby wasn’t one to overlook such details.

            “Tell Mr. Shelby thank you for the prompt delivery.” Ava chose her words carefully, unsure how much Shelby’s messenger knew about what was in the bag. Did he even trust his own men, considering he’d come to make the initial transaction himself? “I’ll be in touch with him as soon as everything is in place.”

            “I’ll pass him the message, ma’am.”

            The man tipped his cap again and turned smartly on his heel. Ava watched him cross the sidewalk and get into a car that looked far more expensive than his tweedy cap let on.

            Ava lingered on the doorstep for a moment, watching him drive away and shifting her eyes subtly up and down the street. It was still quiet this early in the day, most shops buttoned up tight. That made it easier to see if anything was amiss. No suspicious lingerers, no cars she didn’t recognize. She turned on her heel and went back inside, locking the door and double checking that the bolt was in place. She’d told Shelby a week, but the thought of having the diamond in her shop that long made the back of her neck prickle. What if Rosetti’s men or those detectives decided to make a second visit? What if someone made the connection between Shelby and those stones, then stumbled on the fact that she’d been seen around town with him? Maybe that was the encouragement she needed to work more quickly.

 

            It took her five days of what-ifs and bolted doors and glances over her shoulder to set the diamond. She’d considered another tiara at first, thinking that connection to its long history might add some appeal. But was that too specific an item, in case this buyer didn’t work out? And should she even be telling the story of this particular stone?

            No, no. She’d have to sell it on its own merits. The diamond was too large for a ring, impossible to match for a set of earrings, wasted if worn away from the face on a bracelet or brooch. In the end, she’d decided on a necklace, a dazzling circlet of smaller diamonds and emeralds with the stone as the centerpiece, designed to rest on the wearer’s collarbone. She arranged the dense collection of stones in a geometric pattern, inspired by something she’d seen in the window at Cartier a few weeks before. The woman in Paris was mad for Cartier, despised anything old-fashioned. Ava thought she would love it.

            On the day the necklace was finally complete, she slipped it into a velvet-lined presentation box and tucked it into her handbag before driving home. After dinner, once the housekeeper was occupied in the kitchen and unlikely to come upstairs again, she mixed herself a drink and took the handbag up to her bedroom. She latched the door before taking the case from the bag along with Shelby’s business card and placing both on her vanity. There was a phone on the edge of the table, tucked to one side of the mirror; she preferred to take calls up here, where she was unlikely to be overheard.

            She paused though, when it came time to reach for the phone, doubts rising once again about the necklace. Had she made the right choice with the setting? Could the woman in Paris have seen the Cartier design—or worse—bought it already? Ava found herself stalling with meaningless little tasks, dressing for bed, taking the pins from her hair and brushing out the waves, before finally sitting down at the vanity and plucking the necklace from its box. She pushed her hair back and draped it around her neck, fastening it carefully and shrugging her robe back to get the bare-shouldered look of an evening dress.

            Most women, Ava knew from experience, preened and smiled in the mirror when they tried on a new piece of jewelry. For her, though, the thrill had largely faded. A burden of familiarity, she supposed. Not that she didn’t find jewels beautiful anymore, or wear them when she got the opportunity, but they no longer dazzled her. She could regard them with a sort of clinical detachment, as she did now, studying her own reflection.

            It was a well-balanced piece. Elegant, opulent without feeling overwhelming, even on someone of her small stature. The stones caught the light brilliantly in their platinum settings, and the rounded sides of the central diamond were a clever counterpoint to the surrounding angles.

            She gave her reflection one final, frank appraisal, and then reached for the phone. She couldn’t have done any better. Maybe her father could have, but that wasn’t the point anymore.

            Once she’d dialed, she realized that all her hedging and hesitating had likely been for nothing. Shelby’s _business_ card would have a _business_ phone number, and it was nearly nine. She already had the phone halfway down from her ear, ready to put the receiver back in place, when she heard the crackle of a voice on the other end.

            “Hello?” A pause, then impatiently. “Anyone there?”

            Ava brought the phone up quickly. “Mr. Shelby?”

            “Yes.” His voice sounded rough, a bit worn out.

            “It’s Ava Goldstein. I’m calling to let you know that the setting is done.”

            “All right.” Now his tone took a resigned quality, a feeling that there was a sigh floating below the words. Well, not such a surprise that he seemed tired, if he was taking calls from his office this late. “Suppose you’ll want to get to Paris then, eh?”

            “The only way to sell the thing.” She tried to keep her voice light. “Would leaving in three days’ time suit you?”

            “Never going to France would suit me.” Ava thought there was a shadow of a joke there, though it was hard to tell without seeing his face. “But it seems I’m being conscripted for a second time.”

            “Three days, then?” She thought it best to tread lightly, or not at all, on Shelby’s prior time in France.

            “All right.” A heavy exhale followed. She could picture the louche way he held a cigarette at the corner of his lips.

            “Shall we meet in London? We can take the car ferry across from Dover, and then carry on from Calais. It’s a lovely drive.”

            “I’ll do the driving.”

            She prickled at that a bit, but didn’t think it worth picking a fight over. It had been difficult enough to convince Shelby to come along on this trip.

            “You’ll want evening clothes, they’ll insist on a dinner. Especially her, she’ll need the time to talk him into a forty thousand pound necklace.”

            She didn’t mention that the dinner would likely drag out into drinks and dancing. Shelby didn’t seem much like the drinks and dancing sort. She also omitted that she hadn’t exactly sorted out what she was going to say about _why_ she’d suddenly turned up with a dashing yet deeply taciturn travel companion this time around. Well, at least she’d have something to worry over for the next few days, now that the necklace was finished.

            “I’ll have them packed. Is there anything else?”

            “Only the question of why you’re working at this hour.”

            Shelby paused. “So are you, Miss Goldstein.”

            She caught the first hint of a smile in her reflection, overshadowed by the sparkle of the necklace.

            “A fair counterpoint.” She gave him her address in Chelsea, thinking it wiser to avoid any further suspicious activity at the shop. “Shall we say nine? We can catch the noon ferry and be in Paris for dinner. A late dinner, anyhow.”  

            “Nine it is.”

            “Goodnight, Mr. Shelby.”

            There was an abrupt click at the other end of the line. She certainly wouldn’t be able to count on him for any niceties to help this sale along.

 

            Ava spent the rest of the week working out the logistics of the trip and catching up on shop business she’d neglected while she set the diamond. She wired the Ritz for two rooms, booked the ferry tickets, and arranged a dinner with her clients at their favorite restaurant in Saint Germain-des-Pres. The night before their departure, she packed her own bag. Two evening gowns, purchased on her last trip to Paris, day dresses, a fox fur wrap given to her by her father as a birthday gift, and the display case of jewelry she used when she traveled to visit customers. She’d mix the necklace in among the other pieces, not make the sale too obvious. And she could choose from the case for her own evening attire.

            She woke up early the day of the trip to have coffee and toast, staring down the long expanse of her dining room table and reviewing, once more, all the rumors she’d heard about Tommy Shelby. That he and his brothers kept razorblades in their caps, still. That he’d been involved in bad business with the Mafia and somehow come out on the other side. That he had a series of ever-stranger connections to Russian duchesses, communists, Secretary Churchill. That he’d shaken hands with the devil. Her father’s voice echoed back in her head. _Be careful, Chava._

            She’d just handed her coffee cup off to the housekeeper and started buttoning her coat when she heard the rumble of an engine outside her door. A peek through the window gave her a glimpse of Shelby behind the wheel of a silver Bentley, raindrops dotting the slick paint job in a way that reminded her of the diamonds nestled inside her suitcase. She decided against the bother of an umbrella and simply trotted down her front stairs, more rain falling on the fur collar of her coat as she stowed her bag in the back seat. In spite of the early hour, Shelby already held a cigarette loosely between his lips. The smoke curled upward, obscuring his face enough that it took her a moment to realize he was wearing glasses. Something about that struck her funny, oddly professorial for a man in his business. She suppressed a smile as she settled into the passenger seat, smoothing out her skirt.

            “Lovely day to go to Paris,” she remarked.

            “It’ll be a long drive in this weather.”        

            The wind, as though in agreement, whipped a sheet of rain across the windshield.

            “That’s all right, I’m a good conversationalist. Have to be in my line of work.”

            It was a true statement, but one Ava hoped she could prove out today. Otherwise, it would be an awfully long trip. A week on, she still wasn’t entirely sure why she’d gone through with this. She was a little afraid of Tommy Shelby, but also a little bit intrigued by him. And intrigued by the possibilities of having him as an ally. He took her first bait, at least, as they pulled away from the curb.

            “And how did a woman get into your line of work?”

            “It’s a long story,” she said, unpinning her hat and resting it on her knees.

            “We’re going all the way to fucking France, I’ve got the time.”


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow, it has been FOREVER. A new job has been keeping me really busy and I just may have gotten a little sidetracked starting an epilogue for Mending Wall, but I hope to be back here and posting a bit more often now that summer is underway! Thanks so much for your wonderful comments and for bearing with me through the slowest update ever.

Ava Goldstein’s house was yet another surprise in what was proving to be an extensive collection. Tommy hadn’t given much thought to the Chelsea address he’d jotted down during their phone conversation, so he felt caught off guard by the rows of stately townhouses that greeted him through a veil of rain on the morning of their departure. He’d prepared haphazardly for the trip, leaving it to one of his maids at Arrow House to pack him a bag based on the vaguest set of instructions. Based on the weight of the bag when he’d taken it to the car, she’d erred on the side of caution and packed every suit he’d ever owned.

            He had remembered, at least, to call Arthur and tell him the plan. Just in case something went wrong. The call was also meant to be a guilt trip of sorts regarding this entire ordeal, but—typical fucking Arthur—he’d missed the point.

            “Three days?” His brother asked once Tommy had sketched out the details of the trip. “She pretty?”

            “What?” Tommy pushed up his glasses and rubbed his eyes. It had been a long day and he had a longer one ahead tomorrow, driving halfway around the fucking world to Paris. “Who cares?”

            “Three days in Paris with a good looking bird. Come home with forty thousand pounds.” Arthur gave a raspy laugh. “Sounds like a vacation.”

            “You want to go, eh?”

            That ragged laugh again. “You handle Linda and I’ll gladly take your fuckin’ place.”

            “Rather waste three days in Paris than deal with Linda.”

            “Thought as much. Better bring back something nice for Ada, or you’ll never hear the end of it.”   

            “I know.”

            “You never answered my question.”

            “What?”

            “Is she pretty?”

            “Doesn’t matter. I don’t want this to be any more complicated than it already is.”

            “Might brighten up your fuckin’ mood, is all I’m sayin’ about it.”

            “I’ll be home Thursday, Arthur.”

 

            He’d dodged Arthur’s question because she _was_ pretty, and that was something better ignored when you didn’t want a situation to get more complicated. Watching Ava open the door of her surprisingly grand townhouse, he realized that she reminded him a bit of May. Those dark, direct eyes and the electric crackle of an independent streak under a lady’s reserve.

            When he’d had to make the choice—Grace or May?—those characteristics had weighed heavily on him. The understanding that May would never _need_ him, that she had her own life and her own money and a headstrong streak to match her horses’. At the time, a lifetime ago, it had felt like an important distinction. His world had been more insular then, and he’d needed every ally he could get. Now, watching an empire spring up at his feet, he sometimes found himself second-guessing the choice he’d made in Grace, no matter how much he’d loved her. Maybe he would have been better off with a woman who was an escape from his work, not a partner in it.

            Not that any of that counted now, did it? He turned his attention to the woman coming down the stairs toward him, silhouetted against the white marble in a dark coat that cinched tight to mark the elegant curve of her waist. She wore her hat low against the rain, and he didn’t get a glimpse of her face until she’d stowed her suitcase and dropped into the passenger seat. Maybe he should have carried the bag down to the car for her, but he wouldn’t have done it for any other business partner. That was all he had time for this to be. Strictly business.

            If his lack of manners put her off, Ava certainly didn’t show it. She dropped right into a conversation, her surprisingly proper accent a counterpoint to the rustle of fabric as she settled herself into place. The first pause came only when he asked how she’d gotten into this business. He looked away from the London traffic—frustratingly slow in the rain—long enough to glance at her. Her face was thoughtful, eyes focused somewhere in middle distance.

            “Well, you already know my father was a jeweler. He was a pretty brilliant one, actually. Better than I’ll ever be. Which sounds like a good enough job,  but his family fell on some difficult times—my grandfather made some business deals that weren’t very good. They needed money, he had a cousin who’d come to London and made something of himself…” 

            She flicked one hand in a graceful gesture— _you know the story_. And Tommy did. He knew what it was like to be poor enough that you’d do _anything_ to stop being poor, and he’d done it, too. Ava carried on.

            “He didn’t know that his cousin made something of himself in ways that weren’t entirely legal, but I suppose my father was more enterprising than honest. Eventually, that cousin introduced him to someone in a position similar to yours. A man with some stones he needed to sell very quietly. My father reset them and sold them to someone; God knows who, he’d hardly met a soul in London at the time. But after that first deal, he started to make a reputation for himself.” 

            They’d gotten out of the city and into the sprawl of the near suburbs. Ava fell silent, and Tommy used the pause to shuffle through his pockets for his cigarette case. She took one when he offered, leaning down to rummage for a lighter in the handbag resting beside her feet. He’d taken notice of it as she got into the car, surprised by emerald green leather that stood in vivid contrast to her gloomy wardrobe. She lit her own cigarette before offering him the flame, a role reversal that—given their contentious relationship so far—put him on edge. They smoked in silence for a few minutes before Ava spoke again.

            “If I’m boring you to tears, you can say so.”

            “I asked for the story, didn’t I?”

            “Well, if you’re sure.” She shrugged, hair bouncing against the collar of her coat. “Anyhow, that’s how he got started. Your run-of-the-mill fence, setting stones for bigger men in the game. Eventually, he sorted out something interesting. A lot of the people doing the buying and selling weren’t other criminals—they were toffs with something to hide. Lord So-and-So who needs a birthday gift for his mistress, PM’s son with a nasty gambling habit, you get the idea. Eventually, my father built himself a niche as a man with discretion. You could go to him as Thomas Shelby, MP or as Tommy Shelby the gangster and he’d keep things quiet either way.

            “He did well enough with that to eventually get a wife, two children, the shop in Hatton Garden, and a townhouse in Chelsea. Which isn’t so bad for, as he liked to describe himself, a simple man from the Old Country. That was his problem, though. He was an incredibly gifted jeweler, but he still looked and sounded like a simple man from the Old Country.”

            Tommy glanced over at her, a little surprised to see that her face was now set in profile against rolling fields. They’d made good time out of the city.

            “And how did you end up sounding like you fell out the window of Buckingham Palace, then?”

            “That’s the next part of the story. You’re a terribly impatient listener.”          

            “I’m a busy man.”

            Ava tilted her head to study him. “I think you’re rather proud of that fact.”

            He ruffled under the scrutiny, turning his attention back to the road and refusing to humor her with a response. He wanted another cigarette but had a feeling she’d know she was getting under his skin then.

            “Since you asked, my father knew an opportunity when he saw one. He sent my brother and me to the best schools in England. Partly so we could make connections, partly so we’d know how to act around our clients, and most importantly so we’d sound like our clients. I started working alongside him when I was about fourteen. My brother, too. And now here I am.”   

            “Where’s your brother?”

            Considering the Goldsteins were family friends of Alfie Solomons, the answer could very well be ‘dead.’ There had to be some reason Ava was running this operation alone.

            “New York. He oversees the branch of our business there with our mother.” 

            Tommy quirked an eyebrow. He shouldn’t have been surprised, after so many years with Polly and Ada, but a woman running this kind of business by herself was still unusual.

            “They left you here alone?”

            “They didn’t _leave_ me. The business was growing, we had more and more clients in America. It made sense for someone to go permanently, and quite frankly I’ve always been better at this than my brother. I got the main office, so to speak.”

            “What about your mother?”

            “Well, my brother has a nice Jewish wife and two children, just what every mother wants. She’d swim across the entire Atlantic before she let her grandchildren grow up without her.” She paused. “She also never agreed with my father about my being part of the business at all, so a bit of distance is good for us. She considers having a twenty-nine-year-old unmarried daughter her greatest failure.”

            Tommy, reflecting on his own father, considered whether he ought to say something sympathetic. Before anything came to mind, Ava laughed. The sound caught him off guard, warm and a bit raspy.

            “Don’t look so serious, she’s all right. You’ve just never had a Jewish mother.”

            “That’s certainly true, eh?” 

            That earned him another laugh, its husky quality surprisingly charming. No, no. Tommy reminded himself that he didn’t have time to be surprised or charmed. This was a business trip, and one that couldn’t be over soon enough, with a woman he had no particular reason to trust. He’d have to do a better job keeping his distance.

            “How did you end up setting the diamond that got me into this fucking mess?”

            “A necklace. I’ll show you when we get to Paris. It was the only thing for a stone like that.”

            “Do you always know what the thing is for a stone?”      

            “My father did. I only know about half the time. Takes ages to get it right.”

            “You’re young.”

            “Tell that to my mother.”

            She was quick. It was easy to see how she’d be able to move among different types of people. Set them at ease then sneak in a sale before they knew what happened. That was essentially how he’d ended up on this fucking trip, wasn’t it? He needed another cigarette. Ava waved away the case when he offered it.

            “Too many make me jittery. I’ll talk your ear off.”                       

            Cigarette or not, she did the heavy lifting in the conversation during the rest of the drive to Dover, chatting about the jewelry business, Tommy’s horses, Alfie as a younger man (just as cantankerous, it turned out). They stood together on the dock as the Bentley was transferred onto the ferry.

            “Remarkable, isn’t it? Taking your own car to France?” Ava said from below the brim of an umbrella he’d unearthed from the boot of the car.

            Tommy thought about the last time he’d gone to France, hunched with his brothers in a crowd of other men on the rain-lashed deck of a boat, the dreary green wool of their uniforms soaking through in the cold. Remarkable that he was here now, in a three-piece suit with a Bentley and a posh woman and a case full of jewels. Remarkable that he was stupid enough to ever go to fucking France again.

            They followed the car on board shortly thereafter. Ava kept hold of a small bag when the porter came to collect the rest of their luggage; the jewelry, he assumed. She held it out to him when they found a pair of seats in the first class lounge, looking out over the steel grey chop of the Channel.

            “Back in a flash. Keep an eye on this, won’t you?”

            She was gone before he could protest. In a few minutes, she returned with two steaming mugs. They proved to be hot toddies, a welcome surprise after the long, gloomy drive. Strong, too. Whisky fumes washed over his cheeks when he raised the mug to his lips, but Ava spoke before he could drink.

            “Will you toast, Mr. Shelby?”

            “All right.” Not much to toast about this rainy trip to France, but if she insisted.

            “To a French vacation.” She clicked the rim of her mug against his.

            “It’s not a vacation.” 

            “Not with that attitude.”

            It was going to be a long fucking trip.


End file.
